K Foundation
Encyclopedia
The K Foundation was an art foundation set up by Bill Drummond
and Jimmy Cauty
(The KLF
) in 1993, following their 'retirement' from the music industry. The Foundation served as an artistic outlet for the duo's post-retirement KLF income. Between 1993 and 1995, they spent this money in a number of ways, including on a series of Situationist-inspired press adverts and extravagant subversions in the art world, focusing in particular on the Turner Prize
. Most notoriously, when their plans to use banknotes as part of a work of art
fell through, they burnt a million pounds in cash.
The K Foundation announced a 23 year moratorium on all projects from November 1995. They further indicated that they would not speak about the burning of the million pounds during the period of this moratorium.
was the guitarist in an underachieving pop/rock band, Brilliant
. Brilliant had been signed to WEA Records
by A&R
man Bill Drummond
, formerly a member of the Liverpool group Big in Japan, the manager of The Teardrop Explodes
and Echo & the Bunnymen
, and co-founder of the independent record label Zoo Records
. In 1986, Brilliant released their one and only album - Kiss The Lips Of Life - before splitting up. In the same year, Drummond left WEA Records to record a solo album. Whilst out walking on New Year's Day
, 1987, Drummond hit upon an idea for a hip-hop record but, he said, knowing "nothing, personally, about the technology", he needed a collaborator. Drummond called Jimmy Cauty who agreed to join him in a new band called The Justified Ancients of Mu-Mu (The JAMs).
The JAMs' debut release, the single "All You Need Is Love
", was released as an underground white label
on 9 March 1987. By 1991, the duo—now calling themselves The KLF
—had become the best-selling singles band in the world and, according to the Allmusic, were "on the verge of becoming superstars". Instead, in May 1992 they machine-gunned a music industry audience at the BRIT Awards
(albeit with blanks) and quit the music business.
By their own account, neither Drummond nor Cauty kept any of the money that they made as The KLF; it was all ploughed back into their extravagant productions. Cauty told an Australia
n Big Issue writer in 2003 that all the money they made as The KLF was spent, and that the royalties
they accrued post-retirement amounted to approximately one million pounds:
Although the duo had deleted their back catalogue in the UK with immediate effect, international licensees retained the contractual right to distribute KLF recordings for a number of years. The KLF, like any other artist, were also entitled to Performing Right Society
royalties every time one of their songs was played on the radio or television. Rather than spend these earnings or invest them for personal gain, the duo decided the money would be used to fund a new art foundation - The K Foundation. "Having created an artistic machine that created money", said GQ
Magazine, "they [then] invented a machine for destroying it." Quite what the Foundation, this money-destroying machine, would do with the million pounds plus was still undecided.
Music journalist Sarah Champion pointed out (prior to the million pound fire) that, "Being 'in the money' doesn't mean they'll ever be rich. [Drummond and Cauty will] always be skint, but their pranks will get more extravagant. If they earned £10 million, they'd blow it all by buying Jura or a fleet of K Foundation airship
s or a Van Gogh to be ceremonially burned." "There are things we'd like to do which we haven't done.", Drummond told a journalist in 1991. "Totally ludicrous things. We want to buy ships, have submarines. They really are stupid things I know, but I feel confident that in the event of us selling ten million albums we would definitely go out and buy a submarine....Just to be able to say 'Look we've got a submarine and 808 State
haven't'."
"When the first in a strange series of full-page ads appeared in The Independent on July 4", said The Face
, "people started whispering. The cultish rhetoric, the unfathomable "Divide and Kreate" slogans, the K symbols, all suggested that the kings of cultural anarchy were back." Each advert cost between £5,000 and £15,000.
was an award given by the K Foundation to the "worst artist of the year".
The Foundation commissioned more press adverts, instructing readers to "Abandon all art now" and then inviting to them to vote for the worst artist of the year. The 1993 Turner Prize
was being judged at the same time, and, perhaps not coincidentally, both awards had the same shortlist of four artists. The prize being offered by Drummond and Cauty was £40,000 which was double the £20,000 offered for the Turner Prize.
Channel 4
Television broadcast coverage of the Turner Prize, during which three more K Foundation adverts were broadcast — these announced the "amending of art history". During the evening, Rachel Whiteread
was announced as the winner of both the Turner Prize and the K Foundation award. Whiteread initially refused to accept the K Foundation prize, but after being told that the money would be incinerated, she reluctantly accepted, with the intention of donating £30,000 to artists in financial need and the other £10,000 to the housing charity, Shelter
.
Collectively, the K Foundation's money-as-art works were titled Money: A Major Body Of Cash, "seven pieces, all involving various amounts of cash nailed to, tied to or simply standing on inanimate objects". The Face magazine neatly summed up the concepts behind the art project:
During the first half of 1994, the K Foundation attempted to interest galleries in staging Money: A Major Body Of Cash. However, even old friend Jayne Casey
, director of the Liverpool Festival Trust, was unable to persuade a major gallery to participate. "'The Tate, in Liverpool
, wanted to be part of the 21st Century Festival I'm involved with,' says Casey. 'I suggested they put on the K Foundation exhibition; at first they were encouraging, but they seemed nervous about the personalities involved.' A curt fax from... the gallery curator, informed Casey that the K Foundation's exhibition of money had been done before and more interestingly", leaving Drummond and Cauty obliged to pursue other options. The duo considered taking the exhibition across the former Soviet Union
by train and on to the USA, but no insurer would touch the project. Then an exhibition at Dublin's Kilmainham Jail was considered. No sooner had a provisional date of August been set for the exhibition, however, when the duo changed their minds yet again. "Jimmy said: 'Why don't we just burn it?' remembers Drummond. 'He said it in a light-hearted way, I suppose, hoping I'd say: 'No, we can't do that, let's do this...' But it seemed the most powerful thing to do." Cauty: "We were just sitting in a cafe talking about what we were going to spend the money on and then we decided it would be better if we burned it. That was about six weeks before we did it. It was too long, it was a bit of a nightmare."
, Drummond and Cauty incinerated £1,000,000 in cash. The burning was witnessed by an old friend of Drummond's, freelance journalist Jim Reid, who subsequently wrote an article about the ceremony for The Observer
. It was filmed on Super 8
by their friend Gimpo.
Reid admitted to first feeling shock and guilt about the burning, which quickly turned to boredom. The money took well over an hour to burn as Drummond and Cauty fed £50 notes into the fire. Drummond later said that only about £900,000 of the money was actually burnt – the rest flew straight up the chimney. The press reported that an islander handed £1,500 into the police; the money had not been claimed and would be returned to the finder.
On 23 August 1995, exactly one year after the burning, Drummond and Cauty returned to Jura for the premier screening of the film, now known as Watch the K Foundation Burn a Million Quid. The film was then toured around the UK over the next few months (plus one showing in Belgrade
), with a Q&A session at the end of each screening where members of the audience asked Drummond and Cauty why they burnt the money and also offered their own interpretations.
", agreeing to wind up the K Foundation and not to speak about the money burning for a period of 23 years. The document was signed on the bonnet
of a rented car which, they claim, they then pushed over the cliffs at Cape Wrath
. This was followed on 8 December 1995 by an advertisement in The Guardian
:
In November 1995, the BBC aired an edition of the Omnibus documentary series about The K Foundation entitled "A Foundation Course in Art".
The final act of the K Foundation was distributing a van load of Tennent's Super - a high-alcohol-content lager - to London's street drinkers on Christmas Day 1995. However, the Foundation discovered that their choice of location for this endeavour — near Waterloo Station
on the South Bank
— was unusually devoid of homeless people, many of whom were in homeless shelters for the day. "That was a pity", said Jimmy Cauty. "If you are down-and-out, would you rather have a bowl of soup or a can of Tennent's?" The Sunday Times later called the scheme "ethically dubious".
Drummond and Cauty would next work together in 1997, when they attempted to "Fuck the Millennium
" as 2K (music) and K2 Plant Hire (conceptual art).
", released as a limited edition single in Israel
and Palestine
in November 1993. An amalgam of "Que Sera, Sera (Whatever Will Be, Will Be)" and John Lennon
/Yoko Ono
's "Happy Xmas (War Is Over)
", it was credited to the "K Foundation presents The Red Army Choir
". Originally intended for release when "world peace [is] established" (i.e. never) and in "no formats", the Israeli release was made "In acknowledgement of the recent brave steps taken by the Israeli Government and the Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO)". Said Drummond: "Our idea was to create awareness of peace in the world. Because we were worried it would be interpreted by the public as an attempt by The KLF to return to the music world on the back of a humanist gimmick, we decided to hide behind the Foundation."
Also made by the duo during the K Foundation's existence, reported by the NME as a K Foundation work, but officially attributed to "The One World Orchestra featuring The Massed Pipes and Drums of the Children's Free Revolutionary Volunteer Guards", was "The Magnificent", their contribution to the charity album Help
. The song, a drum'n'bass version of the theme tune from The Magnificent Seven
with vocal samples from DJ Fleka of Serbian radio station B92
, was recorded on 4 September 1995. On 5 September 1995, Drummond and Cauty claimed they would "never make any more records". Drummond said, "What do you expect us to do, go and make a jungle record?"; Cauty added "Yeah, like a jungle novelty record with some strings on it or something. It would just be sad wouldn't it? We're too old." NME gleefully informed their readers, "The K Foundation's contribution to the 'Help' LP is a jungle track." Help was released on 9 September 1995.
Bill Drummond
William Ernest Drummond is a Scottish artist, musician, writer and record producer. He was the co-founder of late 1980s avant-garde pop group The KLF and its 1990s media-manipulating successor, the K Foundation, with which he burned a million pounds in 1994...
and Jimmy Cauty
Jimmy Cauty
James Francis Cauty is a British artist and musician born in Liverpool, England, in 1956...
(The KLF
The KLF
The KLF were one of the seminal bands of the British acid house movement during the late 1980s and early 1990s....
) in 1993, following their 'retirement' from the music industry. The Foundation served as an artistic outlet for the duo's post-retirement KLF income. Between 1993 and 1995, they spent this money in a number of ways, including on a series of Situationist-inspired press adverts and extravagant subversions in the art world, focusing in particular on the Turner Prize
Turner Prize
The Turner Prize, named after the painter J. M. W. Turner, is an annual prize presented to a British visual artist under the age of 50. Awarding the prize is organised by the Tate gallery and staged at Tate Britain. Since its beginnings in 1984 it has become the United Kingdom's most publicised...
. Most notoriously, when their plans to use banknotes as part of a work of art
Art
Art is the product or process of deliberately arranging items in a way that influences and affects one or more of the senses, emotions, and intellect....
fell through, they burnt a million pounds in cash.
The K Foundation announced a 23 year moratorium on all projects from November 1995. They further indicated that they would not speak about the burning of the million pounds during the period of this moratorium.
Context
In the early 1980s, British musician and artist Jimmy CautyJimmy Cauty
James Francis Cauty is a British artist and musician born in Liverpool, England, in 1956...
was the guitarist in an underachieving pop/rock band, Brilliant
Brilliant (band)
Brilliant were a British pop/rock group active in the 1980s. Although not commercially successful and mauled by the critics, they remain notable because of the personnel involved - Martin Glover aka Youth, formerly of Killing Joke and subsequently a top producer/remixer; Jimmy Cauty, later to find...
. Brilliant had been signed to WEA Records
Warner Music Group
Warner Music Group is the third largest business group and family of record labels in the recording industry, making it one of the big four record companies...
by A&R
A&R
Artists and repertoire is the division of a record label that is responsible for talent scouting and overseeing the artistic development of recording artists. It also acts as a liaison between artists and the record label.- Finding talent :...
man Bill Drummond
Bill Drummond
William Ernest Drummond is a Scottish artist, musician, writer and record producer. He was the co-founder of late 1980s avant-garde pop group The KLF and its 1990s media-manipulating successor, the K Foundation, with which he burned a million pounds in 1994...
, formerly a member of the Liverpool group Big in Japan, the manager of The Teardrop Explodes
The Teardrop Explodes
The Teardrop Explodes were an English post-punk/neo-psychedelic band formed in Liverpool in 1978. Best known for their Top Ten UK single "Reward" the group originated as a key band in the emerging Liverpool post-punk scene of the late 1970s, the group also launched the career of group frontman...
and Echo & the Bunnymen
Echo & the Bunnymen
Echo & the Bunnymen are an English post-punk band, formed in Liverpool in 1978. The original line-up consisted of vocalist Ian McCulloch, guitarist Will Sergeant and bass player Les Pattinson, supplemented by a drum machine. By 1980, Pete de Freitas had joined as the band's drummer, and their debut...
, and co-founder of the independent record label Zoo Records
Zoo Records
Zoo Records was a British independent record label formed by Bill Drummond and David Balfe in 1978. Zoo was launched in order to release the work of the perennially struggling Liverpool band, Big in Japan...
. In 1986, Brilliant released their one and only album - Kiss The Lips Of Life - before splitting up. In the same year, Drummond left WEA Records to record a solo album. Whilst out walking on New Year's Day
New Year's Day
New Year's Day is observed on January 1, the first day of the year on the modern Gregorian calendar as well as the Julian calendar used in ancient Rome...
, 1987, Drummond hit upon an idea for a hip-hop record but, he said, knowing "nothing, personally, about the technology", he needed a collaborator. Drummond called Jimmy Cauty who agreed to join him in a new band called The Justified Ancients of Mu-Mu (The JAMs).
The JAMs' debut release, the single "All You Need Is Love
All You Need Is Love (The JAMs song)
"All You Need Is Love" is a song by The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu, independently released as their debut single on 9 March 1987. A politically topical song concerning the UK media's AIDS furore, the track was initially given a 12" white label release because of its sampling of other records.The...
", was released as an underground white label
White label
White label records are vinyl records with adhesive plain white labels affixed. Test pressings, usually with Test Pressing written on the label, with catalogue number, artist and recording time or date, are produced in small quantities to evaluate the quality of the disc production...
on 9 March 1987. By 1991, the duo—now calling themselves The KLF
The KLF
The KLF were one of the seminal bands of the British acid house movement during the late 1980s and early 1990s....
—had become the best-selling singles band in the world and, according to the Allmusic, were "on the verge of becoming superstars". Instead, in May 1992 they machine-gunned a music industry audience at the BRIT Awards
Brit Awards
The Brit Awards are the British Phonographic Industry's annual pop music awards. The name was originally a shortened form of "British", "Britain" or "Britannia", but subsequently became a backronym for British Record Industry Trust...
(albeit with blanks) and quit the music business.
By their own account, neither Drummond nor Cauty kept any of the money that they made as The KLF; it was all ploughed back into their extravagant productions. Cauty told an Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
n Big Issue writer in 2003 that all the money they made as The KLF was spent, and that the royalties
Royalties
Royalties are usage-based payments made by one party to another for the right to ongoing use of an asset, sometimes an intellectual property...
they accrued post-retirement amounted to approximately one million pounds:
Although the duo had deleted their back catalogue in the UK with immediate effect, international licensees retained the contractual right to distribute KLF recordings for a number of years. The KLF, like any other artist, were also entitled to Performing Right Society
Performing Right Society
PRS for Music is a UK copyright collection society undertaking collective rights management for musical works. PRS for Music was formed in 1997 as the MCPS-PRS Alliance, bringing together two collection societies: the Mechanical-Copyright Protection Society and Performing Right Society...
royalties every time one of their songs was played on the radio or television. Rather than spend these earnings or invest them for personal gain, the duo decided the money would be used to fund a new art foundation - The K Foundation. "Having created an artistic machine that created money", said GQ
GQ (magazine)
GQ is a monthly men's magazine focusing on fashion, style, and culture for men, through articles on food, movies, fitness, sex, music, travel, sports, technology, and books...
Magazine, "they [then] invented a machine for destroying it." Quite what the Foundation, this money-destroying machine, would do with the million pounds plus was still undecided.
Music journalist Sarah Champion pointed out (prior to the million pound fire) that, "Being 'in the money' doesn't mean they'll ever be rich. [Drummond and Cauty will] always be skint, but their pranks will get more extravagant. If they earned £10 million, they'd blow it all by buying Jura or a fleet of K Foundation airship
Airship
An airship or dirigible is a type of aerostat or "lighter-than-air aircraft" that can be steered and propelled through the air using rudders and propellers or other thrust mechanisms...
s or a Van Gogh to be ceremonially burned." "There are things we'd like to do which we haven't done.", Drummond told a journalist in 1991. "Totally ludicrous things. We want to buy ships, have submarines. They really are stupid things I know, but I feel confident that in the event of us selling ten million albums we would definitely go out and buy a submarine....Just to be able to say 'Look we've got a submarine and 808 State
808 State
808 State are a British electronic music outfit, formed in 1987 in Manchester, taking their name from the Roland TR-808 drum machine and their common state of mind...
haven't'."
K Foundation adverts
The first manifestation of the K Foundation was a series of adverts in UK national newspapers in 1993. The first adverts, in July 1993, were cryptic, referring to "K Time" and advising readers to "Kick out the clocks". There was also an advert for their single "K Cera Cera" which was "Available nowhere ... no formats" and which was not planned for release until world peace was established. The single was eventually released, but only in Israel."When the first in a strange series of full-page ads appeared in The Independent on July 4", said The Face
The Face (magazine)
The Face was a British music, fashion and culture monthly magazine started in May 1980 by Nick Logan.-1980s:Logan had previously created the teen pop magazine Smash Hits, and had been an editor at the New Musical Express in the 1970s before launching The Face in 1980.The magazine was influential in...
, "people started whispering. The cultish rhetoric, the unfathomable "Divide and Kreate" slogans, the K symbols, all suggested that the kings of cultural anarchy were back." Each advert cost between £5,000 and £15,000.
Turner Prize subversion
The 1994 K Foundation awardK Foundation art award
The 1994 K Foundation award was an award given by the K Foundation to the "worst artist of the year". The shortlist for the £40,000 K Foundation award was identical to the shortlist for the well-established but controversial £20,000 Turner Prize for the best British Contemporary artist...
was an award given by the K Foundation to the "worst artist of the year".
The Foundation commissioned more press adverts, instructing readers to "Abandon all art now" and then inviting to them to vote for the worst artist of the year. The 1993 Turner Prize
Turner Prize
The Turner Prize, named after the painter J. M. W. Turner, is an annual prize presented to a British visual artist under the age of 50. Awarding the prize is organised by the Tate gallery and staged at Tate Britain. Since its beginnings in 1984 it has become the United Kingdom's most publicised...
was being judged at the same time, and, perhaps not coincidentally, both awards had the same shortlist of four artists. The prize being offered by Drummond and Cauty was £40,000 which was double the £20,000 offered for the Turner Prize.
Channel 4
Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British public-service television broadcaster which began working on 2 November 1982. Although largely commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority , the station is now owned and operated by the Channel...
Television broadcast coverage of the Turner Prize, during which three more K Foundation adverts were broadcast — these announced the "amending of art history". During the evening, Rachel Whiteread
Rachel Whiteread
Rachel Whiteread, CBE is an English artist, best known for her sculptures, which typically take the form of casts. She won the annual Turner Prize in 1993—the first woman to win the prize....
was announced as the winner of both the Turner Prize and the K Foundation award. Whiteread initially refused to accept the K Foundation prize, but after being told that the money would be incinerated, she reluctantly accepted, with the intention of donating £30,000 to artists in financial need and the other £10,000 to the housing charity, Shelter
Shelter (charity)
Shelter is a registered charity in England and Scotland that campaigns to end homelessness and bad housing. It gives advice, information and advocacy to people in need, and tackles the root causes of bad housing by lobbying government and local authorities for new laws and policies to improve the...
.
Money: A Major Body Of Cash
During the build up to the presentation of the K Foundation art award to Rachel Whiteread on 23 November 1993, the K Foundation presented their first artwork to the press. Nailed To A Wall, "the first of a series of K Foundation art installations that will also include one million pounds in a skip, one million pounds on a table and several variants on the theme of Tremendous Amounts Of Folding", consisted of one million pounds in £50 notes, nailed to a large framed board. Nailed To A Wall had a reserve price of £500,000, half the face value of the cash used in its construction, which Scotland on Sundays reporter Robert Dawson Scott was "fairly confident... really was £1 million [in cash]". The catalogue entry for the artwork stated: "Over the years the face value will be eroded by inflation, while the artistic value will rise and rise. The precise point at which the artistic value will overtake the face value is unknown. Deconstruct the work now and you double your money. Hang it on a wall and watch the face value erode, the market value fluctuate, and the artistic value soar. The choice is yours."Collectively, the K Foundation's money-as-art works were titled Money: A Major Body Of Cash, "seven pieces, all involving various amounts of cash nailed to, tied to or simply standing on inanimate objects". The Face magazine neatly summed up the concepts behind the art project:
During the first half of 1994, the K Foundation attempted to interest galleries in staging Money: A Major Body Of Cash. However, even old friend Jayne Casey
Jayne Casey
Jayne Casey is an artistic director who was known for being involved in the Liverpool punk and new wave scene in the 1970s and 1980s, with Big in Japan, Pink Military and Pink Industry.-Big In Japan:...
, director of the Liverpool Festival Trust, was unable to persuade a major gallery to participate. "'The Tate, in Liverpool
Tate Liverpool
Tate Liverpool is an art gallery and museum in Liverpool, Merseyside, England, and part of Tate, along with Tate St Ives, Cornwall, Tate Britain, London, and Tate Modern, London. The museum was an initiative of the Merseyside Development Corporation...
, wanted to be part of the 21st Century Festival I'm involved with,' says Casey. 'I suggested they put on the K Foundation exhibition; at first they were encouraging, but they seemed nervous about the personalities involved.' A curt fax from... the gallery curator, informed Casey that the K Foundation's exhibition of money had been done before and more interestingly", leaving Drummond and Cauty obliged to pursue other options. The duo considered taking the exhibition across the former Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
by train and on to the USA, but no insurer would touch the project. Then an exhibition at Dublin's Kilmainham Jail was considered. No sooner had a provisional date of August been set for the exhibition, however, when the duo changed their minds yet again. "Jimmy said: 'Why don't we just burn it?' remembers Drummond. 'He said it in a light-hearted way, I suppose, hoping I'd say: 'No, we can't do that, let's do this...' But it seemed the most powerful thing to do." Cauty: "We were just sitting in a cafe talking about what we were going to spend the money on and then we decided it would be better if we burned it. That was about six weeks before we did it. It was too long, it was a bit of a nightmare."
The K Foundation Burn A Million Quid
On the 23 August 1994, in a boathouse on the Scottish island of JuraJura, Scotland
Jura is an island in the Inner Hebrides of Scotland, situated adjacent and to the north-east of Islay. Part of the island is designated as a National Scenic Area. Until the twentieth century Jura was dominated - and most of it was eventually owned - by the Campbell clan of Inveraray Castle on Loch...
, Drummond and Cauty incinerated £1,000,000 in cash. The burning was witnessed by an old friend of Drummond's, freelance journalist Jim Reid, who subsequently wrote an article about the ceremony for The Observer
The Observer
The Observer is a British newspaper, published on Sundays. In the same place on the political spectrum as its daily sister paper The Guardian, which acquired it in 1993, it takes a liberal or social democratic line on most issues. It is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper.-Origins:The first issue,...
. It was filmed on Super 8
Super 8 mm film
Super 8 mm film is a motion picture film format released in 1965 by Eastman Kodak as an improvement of the older "Double" or "Regular" 8 mm home movie format....
by their friend Gimpo.
Reid admitted to first feeling shock and guilt about the burning, which quickly turned to boredom. The money took well over an hour to burn as Drummond and Cauty fed £50 notes into the fire. Drummond later said that only about £900,000 of the money was actually burnt – the rest flew straight up the chimney. The press reported that an islander handed £1,500 into the police; the money had not been claimed and would be returned to the finder.
On 23 August 1995, exactly one year after the burning, Drummond and Cauty returned to Jura for the premier screening of the film, now known as Watch the K Foundation Burn a Million Quid. The film was then toured around the UK over the next few months (plus one showing in Belgrade
Belgrade
Belgrade is the capital and largest city of Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers, where the Pannonian Plain meets the Balkans. According to official results of Census 2011, the city has a population of 1,639,121. It is one of the 15 largest cities in Europe...
), with a Q&A session at the end of each screening where members of the audience asked Drummond and Cauty why they burnt the money and also offered their own interpretations.
Moratorium
Drummond and Cauty announced a moratorium on K Foundation activities in the obscure "Workshop For A Non-Linear Architecture" bulletin of November 1995. The duo had signed a "contractContract
A contract is an agreement entered into by two parties or more with the intention of creating a legal obligation, which may have elements in writing. Contracts can be made orally. The remedy for breach of contract can be "damages" or compensation of money. In equity, the remedy can be specific...
", agreeing to wind up the K Foundation and not to speak about the money burning for a period of 23 years. The document was signed on the bonnet
Hood (vehicle)
The hood or bonnet is the hinged cover over the engine of motor vehicles that allows access to the engine compartment for maintenance and repair. In British terminology, hood refers to a fabric cover over the passenger compartment of the car...
of a rented car which, they claim, they then pushed over the cliffs at Cape Wrath
Cape Wrath
Cape Wrath is a cape in Sutherland, Highland, in northern Scotland. It is the most northwesterly point on the island of Great Britain. The land between the Kyle of Durness and the lighthouse that is situated right at the tip, is known as the Parph, two hundred and seven square kilometers of...
. This was followed on 8 December 1995 by an advertisement in The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
:
In November 1995, the BBC aired an edition of the Omnibus documentary series about The K Foundation entitled "A Foundation Course in Art".
The final act of the K Foundation was distributing a van load of Tennent's Super - a high-alcohol-content lager - to London's street drinkers on Christmas Day 1995. However, the Foundation discovered that their choice of location for this endeavour — near Waterloo Station
Waterloo station
Waterloo station, also known as London Waterloo, is a central London railway terminus and London Underground complex. The station is owned and operated by Network Rail and is close to the South Bank of the River Thames, and in Travelcard Zone 1....
on the South Bank
South Bank
South Bank is an area of London, England located immediately adjacent to the south side of the River Thames. It forms a long and narrow section of riverside development that is within the London Borough of Lambeth to the border with the London Borough of Southwark and was formerly simply known as...
— was unusually devoid of homeless people, many of whom were in homeless shelters for the day. "That was a pity", said Jimmy Cauty. "If you are down-and-out, would you rather have a bowl of soup or a can of Tennent's?" The Sunday Times later called the scheme "ethically dubious".
Drummond and Cauty would next work together in 1997, when they attempted to "Fuck the Millennium
Fuck the Millennium
"Fuck the Millennium" or "***K the Millennium" is an electronic protest song that was released as a single in 1997 by 2K...
" as 2K (music) and K2 Plant Hire (conceptual art).
K Cera Cera and The Magnificent
The only music release to bear the name of the K Foundation was "K Cera CeraK Cera Cera
"K Cera Cera", a presentation of The Red Army Choir by the K Foundation , was released as a limited edition single in Israel and Palestine in November 1993...
", released as a limited edition single in Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
and Palestine
Palestine
Palestine is a conventional name, among others, used to describe the geographic region between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, and various adjoining lands....
in November 1993. An amalgam of "Que Sera, Sera (Whatever Will Be, Will Be)" and John Lennon
John Lennon
John Winston Lennon, MBE was an English musician and singer-songwriter who rose to worldwide fame as one of the founding members of The Beatles, one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music...
/Yoko Ono
Yoko Ono
is a Japanese artist, musician, author and peace activist, known for her work in avant-garde art, music and filmmaking as well as her marriage to John Lennon...
's "Happy Xmas (War Is Over)
Happy Xmas (War Is Over)
"Happy Xmas " is a song written by John Lennon and Yoko Ono and released in 1971 as a single by John & Yoko/Plastic Ono Band with the Harlem Community Choir....
", it was credited to the "K Foundation presents The Red Army Choir
Red Army Choir
The A.V. Alexandrov Russian army twice red-bannered academic song and dance ensemble , in short, the Alexandrov ensemble is a performing ensemble that serves as the official army choir of the Russian armed forces...
". Originally intended for release when "world peace [is] established" (i.e. never) and in "no formats", the Israeli release was made "In acknowledgement of the recent brave steps taken by the Israeli Government and the Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO)". Said Drummond: "Our idea was to create awareness of peace in the world. Because we were worried it would be interpreted by the public as an attempt by The KLF to return to the music world on the back of a humanist gimmick, we decided to hide behind the Foundation."
Also made by the duo during the K Foundation's existence, reported by the NME as a K Foundation work, but officially attributed to "The One World Orchestra featuring The Massed Pipes and Drums of the Children's Free Revolutionary Volunteer Guards", was "The Magnificent", their contribution to the charity album Help
The Help Album
The Help Album is a 1995 charity album devoted to the War Child charity's aid efforts in war-stricken areas, such as Bosnia and Herzegovina...
. The song, a drum'n'bass version of the theme tune from The Magnificent Seven
The Magnificent Seven
The Magnificent Seven is an American Western film directed by John Sturges, and released in 1960. It is a fictional tale of a group of seven American gunmen who are hired to protect a small agricultural village in Mexico from a group of marauding Mexican bandits...
with vocal samples from DJ Fleka of Serbian radio station B92
B92
B92 is a radio and television broadcaster with national coverage headquartered in Belgrade, Serbia. The network's key demographic is chiefly urban and young audience. Its programs, including the news cover topics with fairly liberal political painted attitudes...
, was recorded on 4 September 1995. On 5 September 1995, Drummond and Cauty claimed they would "never make any more records". Drummond said, "What do you expect us to do, go and make a jungle record?"; Cauty added "Yeah, like a jungle novelty record with some strings on it or something. It would just be sad wouldn't it? We're too old." NME gleefully informed their readers, "The K Foundation's contribution to the 'Help' LP is a jungle track." Help was released on 9 September 1995.